Modern Gentleman: Mile High Club

25 Mar Modern Gentleman: Mile High Club

Excerpts from the Modern Gentleman: A Guide to Essential Manners, Savvy & Vice, by Phineas Mollod & Jason Tesauro

This badge of travel lust is a tawdry exhibitionist feat that has little to do with romance. Saying you’re in the club is likely more impressive than the act that inducted you. Membership has no privileges, newsletter, or motel discounts—at best, it is useful as locker-room fodder or for a shared laugh with your lover. Mile-High Club membership should be a natural extension of arousal from window seat to lavatory, and not a coax into action for the specific reward of earning your wings. Notes on the rapacious pastime of some frequent fliers:

• No schematic or intricate plan is necessary. After breathing a few randy come-ons, dare a lover to meet you in the aft starboard lavatory in three minutes. The in-flight movie provides excellent cover and built-in diversion, as the dimmed houselights obscure comings, goings, and flushed faces. For tactical advantage, wait until the aisle-blocking beverage trolley is near your row. Slip to the back while busy attendants and other passengers are stranded on the far side of the cart.

• Send a scout to sweep the area for long lines, nosy flight attendants, or any impediments that might queer the deal. Secure the vacant rest-room and await your partner’s knock.

• Upon conclusion, do a thorough mirror-check and leave the restroom with aplomb, clothes intact, head held high, as you slide the door lock from occupado to vacant and face the world. At this point, even if fingered by the captain and copilot, it is fait accompli. Give a wink for style and return to your seat. Sorry, no smoking on U.S. domestic flights, even in the afterglow.

• Keep it to once per flight, please. In fact, once ever is sufficient.

Advanced technique: When renewing membership, up the ante. Try the forward cabin lavatory or, when in extra-wide first-class seats, the blanket-covered silent spoon. For the most seasoned club member, attempt rare maneuvers in a turbulent, open-cockpit propeller plane. Of course, a love connection made in-flight between strangers is the most naughty and daring form of aviator intercourse.